Civic poll results on April 9

• HC rejects petition seeking postponement
• High Court over-rules SC order

Hyderabad: The counting of votes of the municipal elections in 146 municipalities and 10 corporations would be taken up on April 9 as per the AP High Court order, according to State Election Commissioner Ramakanth Reddy, on Tuesday.

Addressing media persons, he said the court had rejected a petition seeking postponement of the counting process till the general elections. The argument that the results of the municipal elections would influence the voting in the Assembly and Lok Sabha elections did not go down well with the High Court. Different political parties too had opposed the declaration of results before the general elections.

Ramakanth Reddy said, “We are issuing a new notification based on the High Court directive.” In response to a question on the safety of the Electronic Voting Machines (EVM), he said that arrangements were in place but if a decision was not taken by April 8, the EVMs would be sent to the districts for safe custody. There were 11,000 EVMs in total.

The petitioner’s lawyer said that they had a chance to move the Supreme Court. As per the rules the petitioner can move the SC within a week.

75 per cent polling

The average voter turnout in the elections on Sunday was 75 per cent. Ongole was the only district to have crossed 80 per cent in the state. 95 lakh voters cast their votes to elect candidate for 3,990 wards in 146 municipalities and 2,507 divisions in 10 municipal corporations.

17,864 contestants are in the fray in the municipalities and 3,343 candidates in the corporations.

Earlier, the Supreme Court on March 27 had directed the state election commission not to declare the results before May 7 but on hearing the petition challenging the election commission’s decision to announce the results of panchayat raj elections on April 13, the apex court insisted that the election authorities declare the results after May 7.